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Decisions are performatives - or at least, they share important features with performative utterances that can elucidate our theory of what type of thought they are, and what they do. Namely, decisions have an analogous force to that of performatives, where the force of a propositional attitude or utterance is constituted by (i) its point, or purpose, which is mainly a matter of its direction-of-fit, and (ii) its felicity conditions. The force of both decisions and performatives is to bring into being the states of affairs represented in their intentional contents, merely in virtue of the decision or performative’s occurrence and the satisfaction of the felicity conditions they presuppose. The first chapter of the thesis explicates this general framework, and the second and third attempt to show some of the work it can do for a theory of decisions.

This thesis deals with the topic of sequential and parallel grammars. Both of these groups cover a large number of grammar families, most of which, however, are not widely used because of the difficulties related to their processing. The thesis examines some of these grammar types, such as scattered-context grammars, multigenerative systems, and interactive L-systems, with focus on their normal forms. Subsequently, it introduces a set of algorithms utilising properties of the discussed grammar types as well as their normal forms. These algorithms are based on the Cocke-Younger-Kasami algorithm for context-free grammars, and are capable of parsing any grammar in the corresponding normal form. Finally, a program implementing the proposed algorithms is presented.